Feature Gap - Power BI Desktop vs Excel Power Add-ins

[justinwesley]

Hi,

Is there a feature set comparison for what is currently available in Power BI Desktop versus what is currently available in Excel Power tool add-ins (PowerPivot, PowerQuery, PowerView)?  More specifically, what is the current feature gap between Power BI Desktop and Excel Power Add-ins?

If a feature gap list doesn't exist, any assistance in determining what the current gap is will be greatly appreciated.

Best Regards.

Justin

[Seth_C_Bauer · Accepted solution]

I'm not aware that anyone has done a direct comparison, the general idea I see is that there are some missing components in the desktop, but those are more than likely on the backlog of things to add. And there are, and will be, certain new features that you will see only in the desktop moving forward as PBI is really new product on it's own.

The feature request area (here) might help you in determining what isn't in the desktop currently.

[Greg_Deckler · Accepted solution]

Going to do this in a couple of replies. First, in terms of data sources, Desktop supports the following:

• Excel
• CSV
• XML
• Text
• Folder
• SQL Server
• Access
• SSAS
• Oracle
• DB2
• MySQL
• PostgreSQL
• Sybase
• Teradata
• Azure SQL DB
• Azure SQL Data Warehouse
• Azure Marketplace
• Azure HDInsight
• Azure Blob Storage
• Azure Table Storage
• Azure HDInsight Spark (Beta)
• Web
• SharePoint List
• OData feed
• Hadoop File (HDFS)
• Active Directory
• Microsoft Exchange
• Dynamics CRM Online
• Facebook
• Google Analytics
• Salesforce Objects
• Salesforce Reports
• ODBC
• appFigures (Beta)
• GitHub (Beta)
• QuickBooks Online (Beta)
• SweetIQ (Beta)
• Zendesk (Beta)
• Blank Query

Excel 2013 supports all of these except:

• Google Analytics
• All (Beta)

Excel 2013 supports these other data sources:

• SAP BusinessObjects BI Universe

Excel 2016 (First Release) supports the same as Excel 2013 with these differences:

• No SAP
• Add Azure Blob Storage

This is a little weird because some of them didn't show up initially.

[Greg_Deckler · Accepted solution]

Visualizations

Excel 2013 and 2016 (First Release)

• Table
• Matrix
• Card
• Stacked Bar
• 100% Stacked Bar
• Clustered Bar
• Stacked Column
• 100% Stacked Column
• Clustered Column
• Line
• Scatter
• Pie
• Map
• Tiles
• Slicer
• Text Box

Desktop

• All above except Tiles
• Area
• Line and Stacked Column
• Line and Clustered Column
• Waterfall
• Treemap
• Filled Map
• Funnel
• Gauge
• Multi Row Card
• Donut

[justinwesley]

Thank you for creating the comparison list of Data Sources and Visualizations in both solutions.

[Greg_Deckler · Accepted solution]

Going to do this in a couple of replies. First, in terms of data sources, Desktop supports the following:

• Excel
• CSV
• XML
• Text
• Folder
• SQL Server
• Access
• SSAS
• Oracle
• DB2
• MySQL
• PostgreSQL
• Sybase
• Teradata
• Azure SQL DB
• Azure SQL Data Warehouse
• Azure Marketplace
• Azure HDInsight
• Azure Blob Storage
• Azure Table Storage
• Azure HDInsight Spark (Beta)
• Web
• SharePoint List
• OData feed
• Hadoop File (HDFS)
• Active Directory
• Microsoft Exchange
• Dynamics CRM Online
• Facebook
• Google Analytics
• Salesforce Objects
• Salesforce Reports
• ODBC
• appFigures (Beta)
• GitHub (Beta)
• QuickBooks Online (Beta)
• SweetIQ (Beta)
• Zendesk (Beta)
• Blank Query

Excel 2013 supports all of these except:

• Google Analytics
• All (Beta)

Excel 2013 supports these other data sources:

• SAP BusinessObjects BI Universe

Excel 2016 (First Release) supports the same as Excel 2013 with these differences:

• No SAP
• Add Azure Blob Storage

This is a little weird because some of them didn't show up initially.

[Seth_C_Bauer · Accepted solution]

I'm not aware that anyone has done a direct comparison, the general idea I see is that there are some missing components in the desktop, but those are more than likely on the backlog of things to add. And there are, and will be, certain new features that you will see only in the desktop moving forward as PBI is really new product on it's own.

The feature request area (here) might help you in determining what isn't in the desktop currently.

[justinwesley]

Thanks for the link and the lead.  Do you know if Microsoft is focusing on enhancing the features of one solution over the other?

[Seth_C_Bauer]

In terms of BI, Power BI is most certainly the focus just based on obvious resource allocation and pace at which new features are being added.